School problems

[JIN]

Our school administration is really constricting our team at the moment. The school insists on controlling and holding all our money (to keep it safe from greedy opportunists I guess). Unfortunatly, to get any of it out requires days of paperwork and a 30 or so day waiting period after the papers are done. We simply cannot work with that delay, imagine waiting a month to buy a box of screws !
We made a separate banking account to avoid these delays. However, the school found out and demanded the account be shut down, and to give all the money to them.
In addition, insurance policies require us to have a school staff present for ANYTHING we do. We thought this wouldn't be a problem at first. However, no staff member volunteered to have a permanent presence with us. We designed a sign up sheet so staff can volunteer to sit in our room. This gets us past the policies, but the teachers don't do anything but sit, and convincing them to even come is beyond tedious! To make things worse, we're getting complaints for "making them come". This was completly volunteery and we forced no one to come.
To approach this issue we asked the principal to hire someone new who could commit his/her time to the team. The principal told us the school didn't have the money (though I've recently found out they spent thousands on a bowling party or something of that nature).
The school just seems like it's trying very hard not to cooperate with us, though it may be the administration itself giving us the hard time. I also hear rumor that our team will be shut down if we don't solve this. Hopefully it's ONLY a rumor. Please, Our team has ran out of ideas and I simply can't live without robotics (literally), any help? Thanks.

[JakeGallagher]

Our school is being dumb like that too. There's a new policy starting up next fall that a teacher MUST fill out a 5-page form to use his or her room after or before school hours, or during their fpanning period. These are the times when we usually work on the robot!
As well as this policy, we can't update our team's website from anywhere but at school, WHILE logged in as a network manager or administrator...and I think there's a grand total of ZERO team members who have that, so we need to give the updates to our coach, who then sends the update to the server, and *hopes* it will work.
Another problem we have had is one that makes me really mad. Last year, we were on the winning alliance at the Chesepeake Regional in Annapolis. When we got home, our coach asked if we could hang our banner in the gym, as every other team in the school does that if they win something. Guess what the answer was? NO! Imagine that! Do you know what their rationale was? "The FIRST Club is not a team." They called us a club. A CLUB! Even though we're Team #134, they called us a club. We fought with them for a few months, and in september they finally hung our banners, but they were hung off to the side, so that when they drew the curtain to make the gym two basketball courts, the banners would be easily hidden.
What is with this? Are our schools ashamed that they have smart people attending?

[Kevin Sevcik]

I'll get the person who's good with money on our team to talk about that bit later. To address the last issue first, you just really need to hunt in your school for a teacher or staff member that's actually interested in the program. That's really the only way you'll get them to come and be interested, and that's the only guarantee you have that they'll stay. On the other hand, there's no rule that a team HAS to be school sponsored. I recall atleast one team that was sponsored by a community instead and had no school support either, so your team could move in that direction. It would make it a pain to miss classes for competitions, but it's an option.

I can't explain all the details on the money issue, but I do know that we had a similar problem at our school. I believe the answer was for our team to set itself up as a 501(c3) tax-exempt organization. I'm certain this was a painful process, as anything IRS related would be. At any rate, once you have the organization set up, you collect donations and sponsorships for it and your team specifically, and put it in a team bank account, and the school can't say anything about the money.

If you find an enthused teacher sponsor and get the money squared away properly, and the school school is actually threatening to shut down your team for some odd reason, I think your best bet is to bring parents up to the school to complain to the principal. Point out that robotics students are smart and dedicated, and losing them to another school would hurt your current school. Calling someone higher up in the chain of command than the principal could also be productive. A cadre of parents bugging the school board could be helpful.

Also, I think schools have to allow you to set up a club if you have a teacher sponsor and enough people interested. Something about equality and such, but you should ask a legal expert in your area about that one.

So there you are. If you're interested in the 501(c3) thing, PM me and I'll hook you up with our resident financial wizard and she should be able to explain the process.

[Joe Matt]

384 has the same problems too, we must have a teacher/admin with us at all times, and all that stuff. Yet we have people who contribute, but for your circumstance, why don't you go to a school board meeting and bring the issue up, and if they start to go to their 'teacher must be there' stuff, bring a sign up form and ask them if they'll do it, then ask them if they'll personally watch all your finances, and what makes it saffer to have your money watched by someone at school instead of a qualified bank that's job is not to run a school district, but to watch people's money.

[JakeGallagher]

I don't wanna sound cranky here or anything, but I know our team has been working ourselves into the School Board meetings and such for about 5 years or so, and that hasn't helped us a whole lot >.<

[greencactus3]

for the FIRST season, the school was decently cooporative with us but during OCCRA, the robot was basically built in my garage because the school rushed us out and didnt open during the weekends and holidays. and buying a box of bolts... we just bought them from pocket money and took the receipt to school, and hoped the money would come back to us. we got all of our money back i think. well, the cheap stuff we bought on our own and didnt even bother to get the money back.

[misterfoo]

[quote=JIN]Our school administration is really constricting our team at the moment.

Stuff deleted..


On team 811, We are at a private high school so it raises some other issues, for example all teams and clubs at Bishop Guertin cannot do fundraisers or door to door..This makes it very difficult. In fact I believe our students are also prohibited from contacting businesses in the community to be sponsors. Which is difficult in its own way. SO the mentors solicit the donations from the companies that we work for.

For our finances we have to take the donations from our coroprate sponsors and give them to the school to hold. However we have our own budget committee and we monitor the funds to the penny. The school, also being a tax exempt entity, is also helpful to us.

SO for the funds being given out, we work with the school financial office to pay dirrect bills that are large, such as the FIRST entry fees.

For other things like the parts etc, the mentors put them on our credit cards and fill out expense forms. We monitor this spending weekly with each department of the team having a sub-budget. For example controls on our team gets a budget of ~ $2000.00 each year.

For additional expenses we have to vote as a team on what infrastructure we will be building up. For example we get a large piece of machining equipment each year. This year it was a miling machine and a Mig welder. Next year we will invest in a metal lathe or a sheet metal brake.

As for the banner issue, I feel for you. I am 42 and have seen this type of thing go on for years, if you are not a sports team, forget a letter on your jacket or a banner in the school gym. Do I agree with this, absolutely not. But unfortunately this prejudice towards non-athletes exists.

At BG we made a case for letter jackets for the team 811 seniors and won. So stick to your guns and enlist the help of adults, the more people you have speaking out, the better.

FIRSTwill teach you many more things about life than how to build a robot. Intelligent peple like ourselves are creative, persistent and persuasive. Keep working the issues and you shall overcome.

Good luck.

Ken Leigh
Team 811 Mentor

[Spaztik Duck]

We have the issue about having to have staff in the room at all times as well. We got around that though, some of our parents are either teachers in other schools or have gotten certified through the county. You might want to look into what it takes to get certified through your county... getting parents certified really helps.

[JIN]

Wow, I didn't realize so many other schools were holding robotics back too.
Thanks for replying so quickly, I'll take these ideas into account...

[RoteAugen]

Originally Posted by JIN

Wow, I didn't realize so many other schools were holding robotics back too.
Thanks for replying so quickly, I'll take these ideas into account...

Oh, i think you'll find that this is a pretty rampant problem. I know at my school, they refused us any funding or assistance other than being able to use our school name at competition. It wasn't until this year that we got noticed, but when we brought home a trophy from the regional, the principal refused to put it into the trophycase, he just put it on his desk.

they still have not allowed us to work on school grounds, and still have not given us any teachers or money to work with. That's the main reason I am coming back as a mentor next year... because they sure as heck aren't going to get any help from SHS.

the big thing you want to remember is that most school administrations do not understand the full implications of the task we are set to accomplish every year in FIRST. Whether it be the money aspect, or the tools required, they simply don't understand how taxing it is to do what we do.

keep your chin up and your hands busy- life could be much worse

[Joshua May]

We haven't had many problems with our school. Last year, we had a few, being that we had no campus facilities and no faculty advisor, however, our principal is interested in our team so our founder from Lockheed just had to go through a ton of paperwork and became our advisor. This year, we were able to secure the woodshop thanks to the industrial tech teacher at school. We also got the support of a very dedicated math teacher who has done lots for us. The only problem we ever really had was an incident where the principal's secretary said she hated the team because they always had to move our shipping crate, however, we never had it moved at all...

[team222badbrad]

We dont really have any problems like this. However I would suggest you talk to your superintendent and ask for a public demonstration at a school board meeting.

We have been doing meetings like this for years. We have not had many problems with our school. Our school district backs us up 100%

I would have to say our team is the most successful thing our school has. They even pay for the first entrance fee.

The only problems we had with them were minimal. We planned on taking private cars to the Philadelphia regional this year and the school said no. We told the school we didnt have enough money for a bus so the school dug some $$ out of their funds!

Show your school district what you CAN accomplish and what you have accomplished!

[BlueByte]

I feel lucky now.
Our school has been very supportive. Of course our situatin is somewhat unique. Team 647 is sponsered by Shoemaker High school. General Shoemaker (the man the school is named for) is very supportive of our team and fights for use at the svhool board meetings. For some reason the school board has a hard time saying no to him.
We have had money problems too. As a club we have to do our finaces through the school and are even restricted who we can get donations from. We have managed to get around this problem by creating a booster club. Similar to those many athletic teams have, the school district places no restrictions on their finaces. We have a problem with membership though, one parent is largely responsible for it. we consistantly have problems getting parents to particapate in the program.

[Ryan Dognaux]

Originally Posted by RoteAugen

the big thing you want to remember is that most school administrations do not understand the full implications of the task we are set to accomplish every year in FIRST. Whether it be the money aspect, or the tools required, they simply don't understand how taxing it is to do what we do.

It's hard for those who aren't familiar with FIRST to know anything about what it takes to run a team, and that's why it's so very important to do as many demonstrations as possible. Tell everyone in your school about FIRST, get the word out, and make robotics a cool thing that people want to do. When you earn the respect of your students and peers (it does take a lot of effort and time), that's when things starts to run smoothly. Sports and other clubs that have been around for 10 or 20 years often do take precidence over robotics, but it's a challenge the team has to work around. My suggestion would be to just do as many demos as possible, especially in your school. Have open houses and invite anyone, especially teachers and staff. That's what we've been doing for the past few years, and it's working.

[RoboMom]

JIN-I know there have been other posts about these issues, which are common for many schools. FIRST is a hard sell. I think many of the problems arise from miscommunication. WE all realize how great this program is because we are in the middle of it. But we need to make it easier for others to understand. Changing the culture is hard work. It seems like the school is “against” the team, but really it’s they are overwhelmed with running a school and juggling everything that goes along with that.

RE: teacher support. It is vital to have at least one teacher “in charge” if you are a school based program. Is there one teacher who was more involved than the others? Who is your main team contact on the TIMS for all the information?
We have one teacher/advisor. The team can’t work unless a teacher is present. We would love to have more, but every teacher is stretched so thin already. You have to realize that FIRST has a high burnout for teachers. It is an enormous commitment that lasts all year. BUT the team wrote a plea letter and does a presentation at a faculty meeting before the build, asking for teachers to sign up for ONE evening (4-8p) or weekend shift. They can do their own work. They just need to be there and we get teachers from every department. This year we asked the teachers to write their impressions in a logbook. They were amazed at what was happening. Some signed up for another night. They all wrote wonderful things. These testimonials can be used in your chairman’s entry. I know that it will be easier this year to get more to sign up. And then more will help out in other ways. It’s baby steps but that is how change happens.

RE: money. Our major donations were moved to a 501©3 at the school board to allow for oversight. We wanted that! But we have the same issue in that there is week’s turnaround time. So for the major things, we have to plan ahead. But we also have a business checking account with 2 adults as signers. We went through the frustration of having to submit receipts AFTER we bought stuff. So I met with the comptroller and based on previous documented receipts, laid out in a spreadsheet, we asked for advances for the build period and competitions, to be able to buy stuff in short time. I made it easy for them to see that was the best system and they agreed. The money was still being monitored (which is their concern) but in a timely manner (our concern.) Forming a "booster club" is another method and then they could monitor the checking account.

RE: your school board. Our school board (160 schools in our system) is a huge supporter of the team. This has taken hard work. The team just got an award from them and we were honored last week in a ceremony. They feel part of the team. They get an emailed newsletter each month on what the team is doing. They were invited to our local competition (Chesapeake) and the superintendent surprised us and came to the Chesapeake last year. They have to deal with so many problems that they are DELIGHTED to hear about a team of students that are doing so many great things.

We try to make it easy for them to understand. The head of all the school boards in Maryland wrote us a testimonial that I would be glad to mail to you. He talks about the team but also about FIRST. PM me with your address. I did this with another team.

RE: your school administration. Again, they want to hear that you are organized and on the right track. My suggestion would be to request a meeting with the principal or assistant principal. Make an agenda. Do a presentation on all the wonderful things you are doing (raising money, developing a plan and building, CAD,) Don’t forget the $4 million in scholarship money. That always interests administrations. Don’t complain, but do lay out what you want help with, how you can be better partners.

I’m interested to hear about other teams that have jumped these hurdles.